▲ Sangmu Franchise / CEO Younglae Sun

(PowerKorea) Sushi, a traditional Japanese dish, is called ‘chobab’ in South Korea. It became popular from early 2000 and after 20 years in 2021 it has grown to be one of the hottest dine-out menus in the nation. Numerous chobab franchises have come and gone and those that survived are yet competing fiercely to secure brand recognition firm and strong with quality and price as their weapons. 

Opened in 2016, Sangmu Chobab, run by Sangmu Franchise, is running 40 restaurants nationwide with the flagship in Gwangju. Operations and management of all restaurants are controlled by the strict management system of the head office to secure the same taste and quality of food and services. 

If you have an occasion to visit one of the restaurants, you might not regret by trying its best seller ‘special chobab meal’ made of 10 pieces including salmon, tuna, shrimp and eel that comes with a number of side dishes and a buckwheat noodle. If you are a man of cost effectiveness, the lunch special A meal might be the choice. It consists of 8 pieces, a buckwheat noodle and fries and it only costs 10,000 won ($8.58). Other menus such as 4 piece-based assorted menus are also worth trying. The show kitchen gives dinners trust on hygiene and the interior of the restaurants are trendy. 

It is a pride of Sangmu Chobab that it uses the best quality ingredients possible. Each piece of chobab is long and thick and it weighs 14 to 28 grams. Most raw fish are domestic caught and flatfish in particular comes from Wando County. The ingredients that are needed from overseas are directed bought from the head office. 

If marine products take half of chobab, rice takes another half. Rice used at Sangmu Chobab comes from Okcheon-myeon, Haenam County. This hitomebore rice is twice expensive than many other rice on the market. The ripened kimchi used as a side dish, on the other hand, comes from the Mai Mountain area of Jinan County. Korean ripened kimchi goes well with chobab to add an extra delight. The patented partitioned chobab container also holds firm of each piece during the wobbly delivery so that home mealers can enjoy the neat and tidy visual of chobab like in the restaurant.

Younglae Sun, CEO of Sangmu Franchise, emphasizes quality and taste as the top priority of business. And this is the very reason that Sun sticks to his principle of directly managed restaurants only. The same quality and taste at all restaurants are more important than number of restaurants for Sun. For the same reason, staff training is organized time to time on management, customer services, leadership and communication as well as the everyday 50 risk-factor check-list which are being held on-screen due to the pandemic at the moment. 

Apart from management and training, Sangmu Franchise runs second to none welfare policy while makes social contribution every now and then including a scholarship to catering cooking department of Honam University. 

“I hope dinners at Sangmu Chobab enjoy quality chobab at good price. I and all staff value customer satisfaction more than profit as profit often naturally follow when we keep quality, taste, price and excellent services” says Sun.

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